I'm David Friedman, a professional photographer who sometimes gets ideas for photos, designs, gadgets, and other projects. I write about it all on this blog. You can find the meaning behind the name “Ironic Sans” back in the very first post.

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You are reading an entry from the Ironic Sans archive. This entry was posted on January 19, 2009 and is filed under
Games,
Ideas,
You Made It.

January 19, 2009

I wrote it, you made it: Montris

Sometimes I post ideas that would blow me away if they could actually be made real (I’m still waiting for someone to build an Ant Desk). But occasionally I do hear from people who have taken one of my more practical ideas and actually turned it into reality. I keep meaning to write about them, so I’m starting with this one: Montris.

I was eventually contacted by a reader named Chris Kastorff who decided to make a working Montris game. We discussed various factors that would affect game playability: The number of colors, the width of the playing field, etc. He wrote a proof-of-concept game that allows users to adjust all of those factors. (Note: In his conceptual implementation, bricks do not fall on their own. You must press the down arrow to progress the game).

More recently, I heard from a reader who has actually taken the concept and fleshed it out completely into a functional game! He calls it Sirtet. You can find it along with other games on his website.

I like that he penalizes players for making pieces of more than 4 squares. It adds another level of complexity to the game. Nice work!

Comments

It’s interesting, but not as good as normal Tetris.
The early game is extremely easy because you can just have a bunch of columns. Later on, L shapes are relatively easy to make and extremely effective.

The real difficulty comes when multiple blocks start dropping at the same time; the next blocks start getting caught on taller parts of the field.

Here’s a very interesting “1-block Tetris” game that I found. There are, of course, all sorts of 1-block tetris-style games such as Dr. Mario or Wario’s Woods, but this one is unique in that it requires some understanding of color theory.

Here’s a very interesting “1-block Tetris” game that I found. There are, of course, all sorts of 1-block tetris-style games such as Dr. Mario or Wario’s Woods, but this one is unique in that it requires some understanding of color theory.